Twitter may not be around one day, but if you can form relationships, you can take them to the next microblog or social network. And the one after that.

The companies doing social media right (e.g. Zappos, Dell) don’t just do social media as a marketing tool, but as a customer service channel as well. Good customer service, in the long run, can provide very good PR. And brand affinity.

I’d love to talk about this on your show.

I have been surprised and frustrated on many occasions after hearing chatter about a product only to find the home base website for said product to be under construction or having zero information about the product. To me, that doesn’t make sense. Don’t show me the menu then tell me the kitchen is closed.

Within the cigar circles on Twitter, which I am a part of, you quickly learn who sees the value of the medium. You also see a style of positioning that, I think, the old school brands just don’t get. It’s hip, trendy, rough and cocky, but true to itself and the industry. So are those using Twitter. Is it any wonder their products are the most anticipated and talked about?

I hope the old school brands figure this out soon. I also hope that those active in social networking don’t forget to zip their flies. After all the instant chatter about your products, your travels and your dinner, which we generally love, make sure we can easily learn more about and connect your products with our wallets. That can’t be done in 140 characters.

@BlowinSmoke needs another cup of coffee.

Referencing cigar reps trying to use social media as a marketing tool, I beg to differ. There are a small number of us that utilize Facebook and Twitter nearly all day because we’ve found people who enjoy our labels are genuinely intrigued on our daily working lives. I personally have a large number of my Nat Sherman customers (and dare I say “fans?”) on my personal FB and Twitter pages in addition to my running of the corporate pages as well. Most cigar smokers are casual smokers and have some knowledge of the inner industry goings-on, but in reality consumers are asking what we’re smoking, whether is be something new, what our favourites are, and what can the consumer expect in the future. Just like you see here on CigarJack, I am conscious of trying to employ the right amount of discussions, reviews, and my personal insight on a plethora of tobacco topics.

In terms of Nat Sherman’s social media strategy, I can’t say we have anything solid because I’m the only one pushing for a large social media presence. I’ve been driving a lot of our internet presence and monitoring Google alerts et al for some time now completely alone building up a case to show the Shermans the value and freedom (keyword: free) in this new marketing scenario. It definitely brings in new traffic to the store & further increases my visibility as a representative of the company outside of my appearance industry magazines. (This too can drive business because there is comfort in a familiar face/voice.)

I think one thing consumers fail to realize when people like myself or Dylan Austin or Pete Johnson do when we’re on Twitter is we not only provide a closer link to you and your favourite smokes, but I kind of think of it as a confessional. So many consumers are afraid to ask questions and often become overwhelmed when faced with a large selection at a store, so much so that they sometimes don’t even know how to describe what they want. The beauty of this set-up is you can ask us questions and for explanations that you might not do in public for fear of being labeled as a neophyte. I’m not going to lie–we want you to buy our products because afterall we are a business–but we want to in turn take the pressure off the consumer in the sense that instead of making a snap decision & buying something you might not like/know nothing about, it’s another means for the retailer to work with you and ensure you the most pleasurable smoking experience.

Jon Huber from CAO, for instance, can draw a crowd because, well, he’s Jon. People like him.

However, Jon does not make it out to too many events. His reps do it for him.

Reps could actively seek out cigar smokers in the different regions to travel to, give the stores their names/contact information and encourage the stores to add their names to their e-mail lists.

What stores have you seen using social media well?

(Lindsay, jump in here. What’s Nat Sherman’s social media strategy?)

Yes, that is one of the big things they need to do. They should also be using social media to promote in-store events, new cigars, and anything else the company is doing to promote their products.

There is a fine line between tweeting as a representative of a company and tweeting as a person. Right now I see a lot of reps using twitter as a person right now. There is nothing wrong with this, but they are losing out on an easy way to promote their products. The same thing goes for stores that use social media. The line between spam and promotion is tough. It’s nice to keep up to date with a retailer by receiving a few marketing tweets mixed in with some personal tweets, than to get the same 2 or 3 tweets over and over trying to sell me something and asking me to RT.

A lot of lessons about social media marketing can be learned from email marketing. I get emails from 3 different Mac resellers. The first sends emails out every day that typically rotate between 3 or 4 products. The other 2 send out 1 email a week in a newsletter form that highlights whats new, whats happening, and some sale products. I almost always buy from those retailers.

This post was mentioned on Twitter by fixgear: RT @tweetmeme A simple lesson in cigar branding from Drew Estate http://retwt.me/1hyUr...

Jeff: You’re right. It’s good, simple marketing, but it generates word of mouth and it’s cheap. I’m surprised more cigar companies don’t put anything on the inside of their bands.

SmokFX: Very cool. When did the promotion run?

Ron: What do you think reps would do? I’d think the reps should be teaching the stores the value of social media and getting them on Twitter and Facebook, no?